LEATHER

Peau de Chagrin is committed to vegetable tanned leather, a process that uses organic materials, such as tree bark, found in nature to produce their beautiful luxury leather products. The process uses translucent pigments that reveal the unique personality of each skin in the grain, fold and wrinkles of the leather and that retain and enhance the skin's sensuality. To this end we avoid skins that have been varnished or heat sealed.

Vegetable tanning avoids the use of chromium sulphate which is a carcinogen and central to chrome tanning, a quick industrial process used by over ninety percent of tanneries that strips the skins of character, leaving a generic finish and terrible for the environment.

Vegetable tanning can take up to a year and Peau de Chagrin is dedicated to working with European artisans who are maintaining and furthering these techniques.

Lake of Neuchâtel at dusk

Testing the Peau de Chagrin matrixes on vegetable tanned leather for the imprint of the logo and the numbering of the bag / Peau de Chagrin brand / Peau de Chagrin matrixes

The artisan who sculpts the Peau de Chagrin bag conjures his magic in a remote area of the Swiss Juras, free from distractions. The mountains allow him to work alone in secrecy as craftsmen often do until they find an apprentice worthy of imparting the vast knowledge accumulated over time and continue the skilled making of exquisite leather objects.